My travel diaries
Sunday 12 August, 2007 - Camp 2, Muztag Ata, Xinjiang, China
Snow shoe practice
A rest day today acclimatising at Camp 2. I spend most of it inside our tent, reading. In the afternoon I decide I need some exercise and go out to practice using my snow shoes, which I've not used before. I ascend 100m to a pair of tents pitched a little above Camp 2, but I can't help thinking crampons would be more use to me on this section. The hill is too steep and the snow is too hard, and my snow shoes don't provide much grip as I waddle uphill laboriously, feeling a bit like a penguin. They only really come into their own as I return to camp and encounter some thicker snow as I approach the tents. My short walk above camp takes me a whole two hours.
An ingenious birthday cake
At 6 o'clock some voices assemble outside our tent and start singing Happy Birthday . A little surprised I sit up and look across the tent at my two companions for an explanation. Geoff looks as confused as I am, but Luigi has a rosy complexion to his face which isn't due to the cold.
"Yes, I didn't tell you, but it's my birthday today." he says. "I am 46."
Orna has baked him a cake served in a frying pan lid using only ingredients in our ration bags: custard, chocolate, flapjack, and even fruit pastilles on the top for decoration. Despite this fine gesture, the high altitude has caused both Luigi and Geoff to lose their appetites, so it falls to me to ensure her ingenuity isn't wasted. I wolf down my third of the cake and it's lovely. I would be happy to eat the whole thing but feel I should at least leave some for the birthday boy. I leave the rest in the front porch of the tent for Luigi to eat another day, but sadly when we return to Camp 2 three days later it has frozen solid and has to be hacked out of the pan lid using an ice axe. Nobody fancies eating it after that.Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 Next
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